The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1887-05-18

How GeOrgtaS Wealthy Senator Has
Piled Up a Fortune, the Exact
Amount of Which Nobody Knows
- Messrs. Magee, Cole, Inman and
Other Meu Who Can Draw Big
Checks.
Efom The Philadelphia Press.
CHATTANOOGA, May 15.-Southern rich
men are comparatively recent institution.
Before the war the riotous, reckless plant
srs, who used to stake their crops and
darkies on the turn of a card on the Missis-
sippi river steamboats,, or bring their ex-
travagant families to the old st. Charles in
New Orleans for the winter, were con
sidered rich, but their wealth was not of
very tangible character. 1t was seen in
what they threw away instead of what
they had and would not be estimated very
high now in these days of close business
habits, big corporations and almost
unlimited holdings of iron, coal and
railroad stocks. After the war Northern
and Eastern men got mold of what there
was to be'made in the country and until
year or two since, to parody somebody's say
ing about Ben Franklin as great Pennsvl-
vanian, the rich Southern capitalists were
from New York and Philadelphia That is
still fact to large degree; but, with the
extension of the railroad system and the de-
velopment of mines and manufactures, there
have come to the front few genuine South
ern milhonaires living in the South, inter
ested in Southern property and known from
Richmond TO New Orleans as distinctively
Southern men.
CHARLES II. MAGEE.
The wealthiest of them, and probably the
one best known in the East, is Charles NJ.
Magee, of Knoxville He is railroad man.
President for many years of the East Ten
nessee railroad, and very extensive holder,
not TO say manipulation, Of stocks in various
Southern lines. He made his start in life as
school teacher in the thinly settled farm
ing country in the Northeastern part of
Tennessee and thrashed and coaxed knowl-
edge into many of the middle-aged grangers
who now come over miles of rough country
roads to see his splendid house His efforts
in school teaching were probably more
valuable to his scholars than to himself, for
he gave it up after few years
and went into politics long enough
to get into the Tennessee Leg
islature. That profession evidently did not
suit him, either, and in a term or two he
abandoned it and took a fresh and final
start in the East Tennessee railroad. The
progress of the road afterward became his
own history. He prospered with it, rose to
be it's President and made his big fortune
through its profits and his lucky transac-
tions with other roads. When the East Ten
nessee was sold in 1882 to George A. Senay,
of New York, he got a block of the bonds
and mortgages, and when Senay failed in 1884
forced a foreclosure of the line in which it was
Incorporated, and, it is said, r.ade great
profits in both phases of the deal Two
millions each way, or "a, 0O0. 200 altogether,
is the amount his friends. credit him with
adding to his fortuna In the Terminal
A. .N1 l. 4.
great deal of money, and his whole fortune
Is now estimated 20 be somewhere In the
neighborhood OF 100000 Outside of
railroads lie has only a comparatively
small amotint of business, though he has
within the past few years showed his faith
in the New South industries by investing in
ccsa property.
re- Mr.. Magee in appearance is peculiar
enough to be noticeable anywhere. He is
over feet tall, very slender, and of pc
culiar aggressive movement in his stride,
which makes him seem always very full of
important business. His nose is Roman,
his eyebrows large and bushy, his cheek
bones prominent and his countenance sun
burned and sallow. He wears a moustache
and goatee slowly becoming gray. and has
hght-brown hair, which is beginning to
show few streaks of the sand color. In
Tennessee, whatever may be his concessions
to fashion in New York, he wears a plain
Rfhy sun, DSdU, DuU DOD nOJlC6dDlY
and big, comfortable soft hat of the style
common down here below the Ohio He
spends a great deal of time in New York in
connection with his railroad enterprises but
is still very often at home, and regards him
self always as a Tennesseean.
E.w. COLE, OF NASHVILLE.
His rival for the position of the leading
Southern railroad investor is L. w. Cole, Of
Nashville, a tall, heavy, vigorous-looking
gentleman, who reminds people who have
seen national politicians very much of Sena-
tor Cockren, of Missouri. He has his resi-
dence in Nashville, lives there practically all
the time and has his money in Southern
concerns which it takes very few trips to
New York to manage. He began life poor
His friends have heard him tell often how
he first rode into Nashville on a crippled
mule, with his cash capital of &c In his
pocket, and mighty slim prospects of being
able to make it up again If it became, as the
Insurance men say, impaired by any
too heavy expenditure for dinner. He
got into a railroad office after
some trouble, and then, like Magee,
rose from one position to another until he
became President of the Nashville, Chatta-
aooga and st. Louis road. A few years ago
he road was sold to the Louisville and
Nashville, and with something like $1,000
boo as the result of his years of work he
began investing in real estate. His luck
Idyed Win MN as steadily as when IN the
railroads, and he made more money prob
ably than anybody else in Middle Tennessee
while the boom lasted. At present he has
gone largely into the coal and iron enter
prises in Alabama and Tennessee, and is
now president of new iron and coal COM
Dany which carries in its title the names of
Doth States At Sheffield where its princi-
pal plant is located, it is getting five fur
naces ready for operations and will mine
both coal and iron from an immense extent
Of rich territory.
Mr.. Cole is interested i'm so many other en-
berprises that nobody except himself seems
competent to give the full list. He is a
great Methodist, just as active in the affairs
Df the church as in worldly matters Of iron,
coal and real estate, and at hs workroom at
bis house in the evening has a string of
callers from the mines, furnaces and real es-
tate Offices, very plentifully sandwiched
with preachers, presiding elders and prom-
1ent sisters, who want both counsel and
more substantial help. Very often econ
erencen in the vicinity of Nashville causes
stop in his other business, and brings
crowds Of impatient spectators and mer-
chants into anything but Christian frame
II mind.
All through Tennessee his residence has
The reputation of being one of the finest in
he West. IL Is on one of the main business
streets, near the principal hotels and almost